


A Perhaps Hand

by Ani



Series: Unclose Me (The Falls) [3]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: BBC Sherlock - Freeform, F/M, M/M, Post Reichenbach, Reichenbach Falls
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-07
Updated: 2011-10-07
Packaged: 2017-10-24 09:30:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,507
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/261813
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ani/pseuds/Ani
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"They were Sherlock’s old sheets, but his blanket had been neatly folded at the end of the bed, a new wool one laid in its place. He stroked the sticky-soft fabric, gently pulled it back, and climbed into bed.</p><p>The pillow smelled like John.</p><p><i>Yes</i>, he thought desperately, <i><b>yes.</b></i>"</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Perhaps Hand

            221B required his full attention. He would need to catalogue, reorder, to see what remained and what changed; that would be data, which would inform him of the next step to take, with John, which was what was really demanding his full attention but it was too terrible, that mess, that absolute _ruin_ of emotion that threatened to choke his capacity for anything else to nothingness, so at the moment his focus should be on the flat.

            He realized that error as soon as he dropped the key back into his pocket and heard Mrs. Hudson call out John’s name questioningly.

            Coming back from the dead was going to be a terribly messy business.

            “Martha,” he said, loudly, and heard her distant gasp. She opened her door slowly, clutching her hands together tightly, and stared at him. He smiled and opened his arms.

            “Martha,” he said again, “It is me, I’m back. Everything is fine now.”

            She choked out a sob and threw herself into his arms, barely hugging him before drawing back and dragging him into her flat. “Sit, Sherlock. Tea.” She handed him a mug and almost dropped the pot, sitting next him and holding on to his arm. “Oh, my dear boy, you’re _back_. I suppose you have some ridiculous story that explains everything? Where’s John? You _have_ seen John.”

            “He was the first person I went to,” he said, wrapping his cold hands around the cup. “You’re the second.”

            “Well of course we are. He couldn’t come with you? I know he’d want to share the flat with you, it’s so nice now Sherlock, he’s really kept it up. No more _interesting_ smells, though I’m sure that’s going to change now that...” something seemed to occur to her, as she leaned back with a sigh. “Oh, Sherlock. You _do_ know about Mary?”

            “John’s wife? Yes.”

            “They’re expecting a little girl.”

            “I shall have to pass on my congratulations.”

            “You poor dears,” she said, sighing again. “Complicated, all quite complicated. And now _do_ tell me, how on earth did you come back from the dead? If anyone could beat the Devil at chess it’s you, of course.”

            They shared a smile and he took a sip of tea. It was very nice, hot tea in warm sitting rooms. Enough to stay a few minutes. “To give you the quick version, Mrs. Hudson-”

            “Now don’t skip the gory bits. It’s been _dreadful_ boring without you two. Were there arch-nemesis and evil criminals involved?”

            “Is John still telling stories about me?”

 

 

 

            John was circling his street. At the third passed he asked the cabbie to drop him off at the pub instead, please. He had three drinks in quick succession and then started the walk home, very slowly. He watched his feet drag forward and thought about running, about being on a run right now with Sherlock, being cold and tired and hungry and going despite everything because it was _fun_ and not going despite everything because it was _necessary_. When he reached home and saw the porch lights on he called Lestrade. He was very thankful when it went to voicemail, and started with “hello” and then just said “Sherlock is back” because he wasn’t sure what else to do, and hung up.

            When he went in he sat with Mary on the couch and stared off into space. She was reading and laid his head on her shoulder, flipping the pages with a quiet rustle, being so good, Mary was so gentle, to not bother asking him if he was okay. He meant to tell her. Really, he did. He formed twenty different ways to chain the words together, linking them in his mind in an endless effort, but they never quite made it to his mouth. She was used to him being quiet around the anniversary, and so wasn’t bothered by it. That was, John sternly corrected himself, _she wasn’t suspicious_.

            He gently laid his palm on her stomach and so she soothed down his hair and he didn’t deserve it, this; his mind was a thousand miles away, with him, even while his hand stayed steady.

 

 

 

            Sherlock was completely overwhelmed.

            It was too much. All this sensory input, screaming at him, clamoring for attention, me me pick me, and he had to _order_ it, but before he could organize he had to _see_ it all and it was just too, too much.

            Not good. Focus. One room at a time.

            No: larger. Forest. The flat was still here. John still owned it. John still _occupied_ it. Not always, that was clear, but at times. Trees: the kitchen indicated he used to be here frequently; there was a wok in the drying dish, spice rack braced against the microwave, new towel hanging on the silverware drawer handle. It had been used, but was dry. Nonperishable food only, cans of fruit, soups. No bread or meat, nothing that would expire, and no take-out containers in the trash, so he was no longer here for long durations. But a very small carton of milk in the fridge, two days before expiration, almost empty. John didn’t plan to stay away.

            There was John in the milk, that he poured into the tea, which he made because John would make it, if he were here. He put it in John’s mug. Sherlock’s mugs were still in the cupboard, but pushed back, dusty. Not used. Did John find that disrespectful? But he didn’t keep just one of Sherlock’s mugs, for memory’s sake, he kept them all.

            He left the drink on the table and walked carefully into the living room, not wanting to disturb anything, and found that very little had changed. Three years, and very little had changed: here was Sherlock’s couch, carefully hoovered, pillows arranged, undisturbed. John’s chair with deeper impressions of use. The remote was stuck between the cushion and arm. Sherlock set it on the table, picked up the new coasters: ceramic, floral, feminine, not John’s taste. A gift from the new wife? For John’s keep-away flat, no, stupid. A gift _for_ the new wife, wedding present, repurposed. Mary knew about this and didn’t mind. John didn’t consider it shameful, didn’t mind mixing lives. Except: nothing else to indicate her was here. It was all John. John and Preserved Sherlock. So: John moved things, his life, to here, his other home, to be practical, but this was still _primary_.

            His books had been rearranged. Badly. They were dusty, too, the inch of shelf space in front only casually brushed. The other shelves, where John kept his books, were cleaner. Books Sherlock didn’t remember, new ones, reference and pleasure reading. John had kept living here, not just for months, for years. So much had been kept the same, even the curtains, even the bullet holes and spray-paint face, which pained Sherlock to see.

Observe not just what is here, he reminded himself, but what _isn’t_ : no photographs. No images of John, of what he’d done over the last three years. Not one token photo of this Mary on the fireplace mantle.

            Inductions were beginning to form.

            Necessary to get all the data, first. He checked the bathroom (no prescription medication, the same cheap toothpaste and shampoo, recently used shower) and then went upstairs to John’s room.

            It was empty.

            The furniture was still there, but the mattress had had its sheets stripped, and there was nothing in the closet. Not one forgotten sock in the corner. Purposefully emptied. It didn’t even smell of John.

            So Sherlock went to his own room.

            Ah. Yes.

            It felt like sinking into warmth, like what tasting John’s tongue again had felt like, settling his hand on the doorknob and walking in. Sherlock couldn’t believe his luck, that John had kept 221B, and now this. He was _going back home_. He’d never even had a home to return to, before.

            All of his old clothes were still hanging in the armoire, and he changed with gratitude, dropping his sweaty rags on the floor. It’d been so long since he’d felt clean silk, fresh linen. John’s clothes were in there, too, and he pawed through them. Corduroy trousers, a handful of shirts, two jumpers. Socks and pants carefully folded in the drawer, not too many, but enough to indicate overnights.

            John had been here, at night. Yes. There was a notebook of his on the desk, his favourite pens (terrible ballpoints), receipts in the rubbish bin. A cheap netbook on the bedside table, and in the top drawer, a locked box that Sherlock knew must contain his gun.

            Still. Interesting.

            He realized, as he was deliberating, that he was saving the bed for last. So he sat on the floor and peered under. Plastic bins, shoved in careful stacks, which he pulled out and immediately opened. And there were his notes. All his paperwork, that had been spread on the walls in his room, the hallways, all over the flat. Old cases, experiment files, sundry errata on dirt compositions and train stubs, his piles and piles of notes on Moriarty. None of it was organized. So John had gone through and torn down everything, and shoved it away, but kept it.

            Mixed in were John’s notes, that he’d made helping Sherlock, on the old cases. His untidy doctor scrawl, the t’s slanting haphazardly to the right, smears of ink in the margins and the odd, unrecognizable doodle. John never placed the tittle in its proper place, but just somewhere somewhat near the i, in his hurry.

            Seeing John’s handwriting again made Sherlock choke tightly in his chest and...

            He carefully set those pages aside, and resorted them into one box; the others were refiled quickly. He took out everything connected to Moriarty and carried them into the kitchen, threw them into the sink, and set them on fire.

            That was inordinately satisfying.

            Now, the last clue.

            They were Sherlock’s old sheets, but his blanket had been neatly folded at the end of the bed, a new wool one laid in its place. He stroked the sticky-soft fabric, gently pulled it back, and climbed into bed.

            The pillow smelled like John.

            _Yes_ , he thought desperately, **_yes._**

            One couldn’t deduce before the facts, one couldn’t _hope_ for any conclusion, because then cognitive bias would quietly skew the data for you, and yet even knowing this Sherlock had hoped. It had been his shield against fear, against _that ring_. Against thinking that John had left him ( _not a fair assessment; I did leave first_ ), that John no longer loved him, that John had never loved Sherlock as madly and intensely and utterly as Sherlock had loved him ( _because **I**_ _could never just find another_ ), that John might happily greet him as a returned friend but not be _in_ love with him, anymore.

            Clearly none of this was true.

            Sherlock buried his face into the pillow and imagined burying himself into John. His body slowly relaxed apart, which it hadn’t been allowed to perform adequately in three years; no surprise, that he was drifting off to sleep. And so for once he happily allowed his brain to shut down, unwind haphazardly through dissociative connections, breathing in the certainty that whatever else may be he was still John’s and John was still his.

 

 

 

            Sherlock slept for nine entire hours, which was a thoroughly ridiculous amount, and then woke up completely bored. He showered and ate, because one was supposed to do these things, and then even though it was six in the morning he went to the Yard, because Lestrade was likely there, and would _certainly_ need his help.

            He put on his new/old coat for the occasion (Mycroft had been extremely helpful in finding an exact replacement, and he supposed some indulgent administrations could be offered, in this _in extremis_ ) and swept into the Yard, grinning broadly when he was responded to with screams of fright. He might have even set his phone camera to record Anderson’s. (He was going to be allowed _some_ fun.)

            But when Lestrade saw him, the detective just sagged with relief and drew him into his office. “Thank God,” he said, patting Sherlock on the shoulder (he found that everyone wanted to reaffirm their visual perception of his zoetic presence with a physical reassurance and that, furthermore, this was extremely irritating). “I thought John had finally gone and had a psychotic break. Where is he, by the way?”

            “Home with mother and future-child, hoovering, I expect.”

            Lestrade raised his eyebrows. “Nice to see you too. Have a seat. You look dead on your feet.”

            “I’m well-rested and - was that a _joke_?”

            “I have a list of ‘em. Sit.” He pointed until Sherlock did so and then dug out a clipboard from his pile of stapled papers. “So.”

            “So, yes, I was never actually dead, but actually travelling the world in secret for three years to save our fragile law and order and now that _that’s_ done I’m back in London.” Sherlock rechecked his phone which _still_ did not have a reply message from John. “As you’ve been without my aid for three years, I thought I’d see if you’ve any work. Amazed the place hasn’t burnt down without me, really.”

            “Funny. I always had the exact opposite reaction.” Lestrade set down a chosen sheet, which Sherlock was very interested to see was a list of numbers, all bearing John’s name. “Where is John, really?”

            “At home? At work? I don’t know,” he snapped. That sign of irritation was obviously a mistake, as now Lestrade made a very smug, sympathetic smile.

            “Are you not working together, anymore?”

            “Not at the moment,” Sherlock lied.

            “Uh huh. Busy, is he.”

            “I don’t see why everyone needs to ask this question.”

“Maybe because everyone knows the great Sherlock Holmes and his blogger John Watson as completely inseparable.”

“ I did just fine without him for years. I can continue to do so.”

            “You did, did you?”

            They both knew this wasn’t true, but damned if Sherlock was going to admit this. Lestrade scratched his head and sighed.

            “Sherlock. I don’t think-”

            “I am _not_ here to talk about John.”

            Now he just looked sad. And Sherlock _hated_ pity. He thought about just storming out, except that he really needed something to do, something that wasn’t sitting around the flat alone, thinking of John. He hated that fact, too, but disliking something wasn’t going to change its reality; better to acknowledge and find solutions than fight it. “All right,” Lestrade said finally, grabbing a manila folder and sliding it over to Sherlock. “There’s been three kidnappings from the same school in the past month, but no missing personnel, and no connection between the families.”

            Sherlock perused the pages as Lestrade prattled on, aware, in a distant way, that this wasn’t helping, that he wasn’t feeling up and on and gleefully frantic, as he should, with an interesting case. He just felt tired. Tired and desperate to hear from John.

            It was still all quite wrong.

 

 

 


End file.
